Better Than Being a Superhero
by SpeedyQueen
Summary: Dean was always used to being Sammy's big brother. Sometimes, he even thought it was cooler than being a superhero. Being a big brother isn't always easy though, and looking out for Sam never went as smoothly as it should.
1. Just Another Morning

**_Sometimes being a brother is even better than being a superhero_. ~Marc Brown**

* * *

Sam turned over in bed with eyes still shut, crust clinging to the smooth edges. The young hunter lay on the stiff motel bed, sheets crumpled all around. Sam had a habit of creating a pool of covers at the edge of the bed before a night was over. This was the reason why no one wanted to share a bed with the kicking nightmare, not that Sam would ever complain about that. The sheets had a faint smell of mildew, but that was nothing Sam wasn't used to, being in the Winchester family for 17 years.

Next to the younger, slowly waking hunter lay Dean, still clinging onto unconsciousness in earnest. He was still getting over celebrating his twenty-first birthday with his dad a couple of days before. Of course he would have been over it by now if he hadn't felt the need to keep the celebration going on during the day after as well. Sam had berated him for his lack of control the previous day, and now Dean was starting to think his piece-of-shit little sibling might have been right after all.

The two had spent the previous day hanging out together, their dad catching up with some old hunting buddies a couple of towns over. The two rarely had a free day together, and they certainly took advantage of it. Beer cans littered the small, stagnant room, combining with various food wrappers to form a perfect picture of a good night in.

Sam finally drudged out of bed and stumbled into the off-white bathroom, flicking on the fluorescent light upon entry. The shower was running before the lights had time to finish turning on completely, and even then they remained oscillating between a glaring bright and muggy dim setting. Sam hopped in the lukewarm shower and let the water drip through knotted brown hair, washing away any residual feelings of grogginess and minor hangover. Sam wasn't just going to let Dean drink everything yesterday, after all. Even though Sam refused to let Dean have all the fun yesterday, the vast majority of cans littering the room behind the shower tiles still remained to the newly 21-year-old. Sam continued to get clean, even using the toothbrush in the shower, a time-saving habit picked up from years spent rushing from place to place.

By the time Sam dried off and got dressed in some simple dark sweats and a beige T-shirt, Dean was rising from his bed across the tiny main room. Sam flicked on the T.V., which was taking up what seemed like half of the miniscule room they currently lived in, and promptly changed the station to whichever one was playing Spongebob. Dean looked up from the ground he was half lucidly staring at to give a smirk towards the T.V. His little sibling had been hooked on that show since before the two of them had been tall enough to reach the television set to change the station themselves.

"Morning dude" said Dean, announcing his arrival in the world of the conscious to Sam.

"You look like hell man" replied Sam, taking in Dean's extra-rugged aura. Sam hadn't expected much else, however, considering how much fun they had the day before.

"Yeah, and I feel like it too, make sure you're ready by the time I'm out of the shower, I just saw a text from Dad saying he's found a case he wants us to take the lead on."

Sam simply nodded in response, finally getting used to their father handing them more and more duo cases; "preparing them for the world", as he had called it.

As Dean stumbled into the still-foggy bathroom, Sam plopped down on the bed with the covers kicked down to the edge and put on some shoes. Sam began thinking about everything they would need to be prepared for whatever hunt they were being given; dad would not be disappointed in them again.

As soon as Sam began packing both of their duffel bags with everything they could possibly need, a curt knock on the door signaled John's unusually quick return.

"Hey Sam, I hope Dean told you what I sent him."

"Yeah Dad, he just hopped in the shower so we should be ready pretty soon" responded Sam, awkwardly rubbing the still wet brown hair back out of the way of anxious eyes. Sam didn't like talking to Dad without Dean around- he was always accusing Sam of not being good enough for the job, and without Dean for backup, Sam was always left scrambling for ways out of the cold accusations.

"Alright," huffed John "He better hurry up because this case is important and I have another hunt I have to leave for about five minutes ago." He pulled up and sat in a chair at the small table by the entrance. Sam grabbed the remaining chair and copied suit.

And so John and Sam sat for semi-awkward silence with only a Spongebob re-run in the background to cut through the piercing silence.

Not a moment too soon, Dean's tall form appeared through the bathroom doorframe. He had reached his maximum height a few years back and was still taller than Sam, though his younger sibling was rapidly threatening to overtake him. Dean closed the door behind him and ruffle a stiff white towel through his hair, clad only in another thin towel tied around his waist.

"Ew Dean, put on some frickin' clothes!" Exclaimed Sam, embarrassed by her brother's blatant disregard for common decency. I mean sure they lived less than ten feet from each other their whole lives, but still.

"C'mon Sammy, I know you're just jealous of my awesomely defined biceps, it's okay, I understand."

"Very funny Dean, now can you please get dressed so we can get out of here?" Dean heard the hidden message in his siblings tone and shifted his eyes towards his father. He took the hint and threw on some clothes while the other two looked away and joined them at the small table, dwarfed by the presence of the three hunters.

"Now this is a big hunt for you two to take on alone," The oldest Winchester started "but, I know you can handle yourselves and I'm needed somewhere else to help Bobby."

Both John's kids nodded solemly, showing that they understood the gravity of the task in front of them.

Satisfied that both kids were paying careful attention, John leaned forward almost imperceptibly and ran through all the details and facts about the hunt he could find. They would be going to a city on the California coast, which was thankfully only half a day's drive from where they were currently holed up in in Tehachapi, California. As soon as all the relevant details had been layed out and crudely planned- without so much as a single comment or piece of input from Sam- John turned to grab something to eat before he left.

Sam and Dean rose and finished gathering all of the required supplies for the adventure ahead of them. Their father started heading towards the door with a fresh mug of coffee. With a stoic and solemn expression on his face, he turned to face his kids.

"I know you guys can do this. Just watch each other's backs and remember your training. Lives are depending on you."

"We know dad, we've got this covered, don't worry." Dean stated with an unusual tone of seriousness in his voice.

John nodded and crossed the threshold of the door before he turned around, looking like another important thought just crossed his mind.

"And Dean," he added purposefully, "look out for your sister."

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**So here we are! Hope the ending caught at least some readers by surprise. Next chapter will have the hunt explained more clearly and some more action. Much protective brotherly fluff to ensue in all chapters henceforth. This will be a sort of case fic, but there will be Sam angst, with Dean there to pick up the pieces. Please review if you want more!**


	2. The Plot Thickens

The ride out to San Ramon, California turned out to be an ordinary Winchester roadtrip. The impala sped along, constantly pushing that 10-mile-over the speed limit barrier. Dean was anxious to get there. He was anxious to prove to his dad that him and Sam could tackle any kind of hunt he threw at them. Of course in the back of his mind Dean was worried for his little sister. Ever since she started hunting, before even getting to high school, Dean had developed a need to protect her from every bad thing they willing searched out and put an end to.

Dean's protectiveness of Sam started when she was still in elementary school, and he had to do all the little things for her before school when dad was away on a trip. Pull her hair into pigtails. Grab the milk from the high shelf in the fridge for her cereal. Put extra salt across her door to stop any stray demons from entering. The little things. Dean's innate need to protect Sam increased exponentially when she first started hunting. When doing day to day things, Dean could harness his feelings about Sam, but when she was in danger, there was nothing her big brother wouldn't do to help her. Dean was just starting to remember his and Dad's very first hunting trip with Sam when she blurted out from the passenger seat:

"There it is Dean! San Ramon, 27 miles ahead."

"Awesome, my butt if really starting to get sore." Dean replied in earnest- the car trip was really starting to get old. There was only so much open road and California desert hills one person could take in a morning.

Sam shifted around in her seat, agreeing with Dean about the sore glutes. She was so used to expending massive amounts of energy that it was hard to contain the teenager in a vehicle for very long without her getting ancy That, and she really needed to pee.

"Can you pull over at the next gas station? I really gotta pee."

"Can't you hold it for another half an hour? We're almost there?" Sam gave Dean a look so pathetic that he almost gave in. "Geeze Sam, what is it with girls and their need to pee every few minutes? Can you please just try to hold it until we get to the motel?"

Sam huffed and sank back down into her leather seat. "Fine. If I explode, it's all your fault and I am not cleaning the upholstery."

Dean smirked and pushed the speed limit even further, knowing that Sam probably did actually need to go, but it really was funny watching her squirm every now and then.

The sun was just starting to fade as they pulled into a small motel on the outskirts of the city.

Dean hopped out of the car, making sure to close and lock it behind him, and walked into the front office of the sleazy building. He always locked all the doors when Sam was left in the car alone. It was another habit he picked up from when she was a little girl, but he thought it was even more pertinent now. His little sister really was beautiful. He hated thinking of her in any way as the object of a man's desire, but he was proud of what a lovely woman she was becoming.

She was not only beautiful on the outside, but her personality was so warm, so opposite of the life that they lived. He knew that she deserved better, and that maybe he held her in such high regard simply because he was her brother. He knew for a fact that she was quick as a whip- her grades and witty remarks attested to that. If she wanted to, Dean knew that she could get out of this life and make something great of hers. Become whatever she wanted, be with whomever she wanted. It was thoughts like this that saddened Dean, in a way that only someone so special's protector could know.

It was the fact that Sam was so special that pushed Dean to go the extra mile for her safety. He knew others could see her for her skin-deep beauty, and so he locked the door behind himself as he walked up to the worn-down door of the office. He glanced back before walking inside, just long enough to see her curled in on herself, like she had been for the majority of the last half hour of their journey here.

Once inside the main office building, Dean quickly caught the eyes of the older man manning the counter. He had one of those faces that put Dean at ease right away, snapping him out of his thoughts.

"One room please, two beds and preferably around the back of the building." Dean stated, before even giving the other man a chance to speak.

The elderly man nodded and typed a few things in to the ancient computer in front of him before taking the cash from Dean and handing him the room key. Dean nodded in way of a thanks and proceeded to get back into the Impala and pull it around back.

Sam rose once the engine stopped and brushed her long dark hair out of her face before turning to her brother and asking if he needed any help carrying their stuff inside. Dean denied needing the extra help and tossed Sam the key, knowing she would want to rush to the bathroom as soon as possible.

She darted out of the car and turned the key in the slot, thankful the door didn't seem to need any extra coercion to open. She quickly spotted the bathroom at the back of the cookie-cutter motel room and rushed inside, promptly shutting the door behind her.

Dean entered barely a minute later, placing their duffels on the proper beds, and started looking at the papers John had given them before they left Tehachapi. Sam walked out of the restroom and immediately joined him in trying to decipher the documents. Newspaper clippings and a few hand-scrawled notes soon littered the small side table with a young Winchester perched in a plastic chair on either side.

Sam finally spoke up after about ten minutes, "So it looks like we've got an angry spirit that is targeting local teens. Nothing we haven't handled before."

Dean looked up at his sister and said "Yeah it looks straightforward, but Dad seemed worried about us doing this case. Well, more worried than usual."

"I don't really see why though, remember that last salt and burn we handled in Mississippi? That went fine, only took us a few days to figure out who the spirit was."

"Well obviously something about this case has Dad worried, so we better try to get this over with as quick as possible. This thing has already killed three, and if the pattern so far gets followed, the next victim will show up by tomorrow night."

Sam nodded and got up, rummaging through her duffel for some snacks.

"Do you want to get some real food instead of just those whatever-covered pretzel crap you like?" Dean asked, knowing she had to be hungry by now, because he had been hungry for hours.

"Dude you don't know how much I want to real food right now."

"Well then c'mon, I'll bring the papers so we can get some work done while we eat."

And so the two sibling piled back into the trusty Impala and pulled into the closest diner. They happened to have stumbled in during a particularly busy time, and were put at a table so close to others; it was a wonder they could hear each other over their neighbors' conversations. This, as it turns out, worked to their advantage because apparently the talk of the town was the spree of killings over the last couple of weeks. Dean quickly figured that it would be more useful for him to try to do some observing and leave the physical research to Sam while waiting for their food.

The waitress that had taken their order about fifteen minutes prior returned with plates full of food just as a young family to the right of them said something that caught Dean's full attention.

"It's just so tragic that everyone who's been killed was so young" the young mother practically whispered. The man who Dean assumed to be her husband started rubbing her back.

"I know Beth, but all the police in the city are on this case, it's only a matter of time before whoever's doing this is stopped." The man assured his wife, still rubbing soothing circles.

"I just hope this gets stopped before another girl goes missing. Imagine if Marie was that age and all of her friends started disappearing."

The man suddenly stopped rubbing circles, apparently disturbed himself by his wife's rantings. "If someone took my little girl like they did to those others, then I don't know what I would do Beth."

That snippet of conversation was enough to significantly cut down Dean's appetite. No wonder Dad had been so worried about sending him and Sam alone on the case. Sure they could handle a case where teenagers went missing, but a spirit with a penchant for teenaged girls was enough to scare any dad in their right mind. Dean glanced over at his sister while going over the details of the deaths in his mind once more.

Sam was chowing down happily on her chicken sandwich. Like always, she was trying to be at least semi-healthy with her on the road food choices. Obviously she stayed fit from the line of work they were in, but eating healthy too didn't seem to be a cosmetic choice. Sam was smart, and she knew how crappy all those burgers her brother and dad shoved down their faces were for them. She could withstand the mockings about eating "girl food" from Dean, especially since she usually just answered right back "I am a girl Dean, get over it" and went on eating.

Dean was still looking at Sam when the facts aligned in his head. The reason the dad sitting next to him went stiff while talking about the killings. It wasn't just the fact that local girls kept turning up dead, it was the way they were turning up. Each girl had been missing for a couple of days before a body had been found. Dean needed to see those autopsy reports. He needed to know what happened in those few days. He lost his appetite completely as his mind wandered off, conjuring up horrific images in his head, all while his peripherals kept an eye on his ignorantly content little sister, who happened to fit the profile to a tee. It was only after a few minutes of Dean not eating that Sam looked up from her decimated plate of fries and sandwich to catch her brother's eyes.

"Dean, what's wrong?" she asked innocently, a small fleck of forgotten fry flicking off with the motion of speaking. Dean gulped hard as his eyes bored into his sister, not really seeing her, but still replaying images of what he had conjured up just moments before.

"Nothing Sammy. We should get you back to the motel, I have to pay a visit to the coroner. Alone."

"Yeah okay, sure." Sam responded uneasily, sensing something off with her brother. "You going to be a detective or something this time?" she asked, knowing that there were times that she just looked too young to pull off a disguise, no matter how good their fake I.D.s were.

"Something like that." Answered Dean cryptically. He didn't want to freak out Sam before knowing exactly what was going on, but at the same time he knew Sam would figure it out for herself sooner rather than later. And so Dean left enough cash to generously cover their tab before booking it out of the crowded little diner, his hand with a firm grasp on Sam's shoulder the whole time he led the way out of the restaurant.

Without a single word on the drive home or the walk up to the aging door of their motel room, Dean led Sam into the dilapidated room that they would be living in for the next few nights.

"I'm gonna leave you with twenty bucks in case you need something delivered, but I don't want you going outside or opening the door for anyone except me or the delivery guy until I say so, alright?"

"Sure _Dad, _you do know I'm not twelve anymore, right?" an exasperated Sam asked Dean, tired of the silent treatment she had gotten on the way home from the diner.

"I know I'm not treating you like I should right now, but can you please just stay safe for me while I figure all of this out? I shouldn't be gone too long, and then hopefully we'll have some more answers about this case, and then I promise you can help me out."

Sam flung herself onto the bed closest to the door dramatically, muttering something along the lines of "yeah…sure…whatever Dean…"

Satisfied at his sister's compliance to his strict safety policies, Dean curtly nodded before leaving the room and locking the door.

"I better hear you dead-bolting that shut behind me, Sammy!" he yelled into the cool night air. After he heard Sam's muted shuffle towards the door and the tell-tale 'click' of the deadbolt, Dean got into the Impala and headed towards where he knew the police station and county coroner's office were.

He was going to figure out what this creature was and what it wanted with the girls before it had a chance to touch his baby sister. And if that meant keeping her in the dark for a little while and reducing her to a solitary, safe stay in the motel room, Dean was okay with that. Even so, he began to grow more and more pissed at their dad sending both of them on this mission. He could've just sent Dean and left Sammy safe in some other state! Why would he feel the need to send Sam to do a hunt with a dangerous pedophile of a monster if Dean could take care of this himself? Unless…

No. Dean knew even _their _dad wasn't that stupid, right? No way could he use- No. He still couldn't even fathom it. But why else would Dad send both of them to a job where one hunter would obviously be a giant target? Except that in any other case, with any other hunter, the answer was obvious. Sam was sent to be the bait. And that was probably the only way they were going to be able to catch up to this thing.

Damn. Dean hated hunter logic.

His high-beams soon flashed on the sign welcoming drivers to the police station. Dean steeled himself for learning more about what this thing wanted with kids like Sam.

* * *

While Dean prepared to learn about this monster first-hand, Sam was back at the room researching like nobody's business. She had to figure out why Dean had been so cryptic.

After about only half an hour of solo research time, Sam let out an unintentional gasp as the pieces fell together, much like they had for Dean earlier that evening.

Whatever was out there was taking girls from their homes. And wherever it was taking them, they didn't even show up dead until a couple of days later. And whatever it was, it would definitely want piece of her.

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**There we are! Please review if you want to read more. I love constructive criticism and want to improve my writing. Thanks for reading!**


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